Had to have high, high hopes for a living Didn’t know how but I always had a feeling I was gonna be that one in a million Always had high, high hopes When “High Hopes” by Panic! At the Disco came on the radio one morning on the way to work, I thought, wow, that song is definitely going on my workout/running playlist. It’s such a positive song. I even added it to my public “Office Radio” playlist which my office actually plays through the PA to motivate my coworkers. Well, former office. I didn’t know at the time that... Continue reading...

I grew up on the Beatles. When your parents were both educated in England during the 1960s mod era, those would be the records they brought home. (Well, dad did.) There were also Elvis Presley and the Carpenters, but the mainstay was usually John, Paul, George, and Ringo. My parents were so Anglophile-posh with their musical choices that I didn’t know the hippie period of the Beatles until much later on in life. That also means that I also had no idea who the Rolling Stones or David Bowie was. Elton John was introduced into the pool just enough to get us... Continue reading...

I wrote this originally on June 9, a day after the death of Anthony Bourdain, all on my phone. Something I don’t usually do, but I had to get it off my chest. Entering the Anger stage of grief over here. Getting really annoyed at people talking about depression as if you have to be visibly crying and moping in public all the time, or that they should have reached out for help instead of keeping their problems to themselves. It doesn’t work that way. Depression drags you down, makes you feel worthless, useless, and unimportant so much so that... Continue reading...

Friends, we’ve adulted. We’ve just bought our first home. And we dub it Castle Boren. Well, I’m calling it #CastleBoren. It fits the description. 3 stories with bedroom suite on the top floor. And with just the 2 of us, having 3 bedrooms is a lot of house. Best part? 100 yards down from where we’ve been renting for 10 years. It all happened so fast. We weren’t quite expecting to buy a house this year. At all. But as those who’ve read “The Alchemist” knows, when things are meant to happen, things will happen. It started when I went... Continue reading...

As far as I am concern, there is only one house that I can really call mine. The house in Bangkok that I grew up in. Designed by my dad, this brick town home was way ahead of its time. It’s the house that launched several other brick town homes around the city. The first town home (on the right in this picture) was share between the household kitchen and living quarter for our cook and driver on the ground floor. (Yes, we were very Downton Abbey in that sense). Princess Grandmother’s quarter was on the second floor, and dad’s... Continue reading...

I just wrote an email to my brothers. It goes something like this: You don’t know what it is at first but suddenly your heart flutters and you feel like you couldn’t catch your breath. Then your heart sinks. It feels so heavy as if it’s pulling your shoulders the floor along with itself. Anxiety attack? Sounds like it. But it isn’t. But then tears well up in your eyes, and you realize it’s mom you’re missing. What you feel is a hole left by her absence. And then you cry. Sometimes the whole sinking heart thing goes away. Sometime... Continue reading...